Chorizo Verde (Toluca Green Chorizo)

Chorizo verde is the green chorizo of Toluca and the valley around it in the State of Mexico: fresh ground pork worked with a raw green paste of roasted poblano, tomatillo, cilantro, serrano and toasted pumpkin seeds, stuffed in short tied links and sold fresh beside the red chorizo in the Toluca markets. It is cooked the same way as the red one — out of the casing, crumbled and fried — and eaten in tacos, with eggs or with potatoes, and it comes out of the pan an appetising green with a bright, herbal, nutty flavour. The diagnostic detail is what it replaces: the dried red chiles that make every other Mexican chorizo red are swapped for fresh green ones and herbs. It looks ancient and is not. The red Toluca chorizo is colonial; the green one is first described in the 1970s, by a researcher who noticed it was absent from a 1976 account of Toluca chorizo, and the price-of-chiles story told about it is plausible and unproven. I have not made this one yet; the formula is built from Marianski’s chorizo verde and a 2017 review of Toluca chorizos, and it is untested.

Ingredients

MEAT BLOCK (2,270 g / 5 lb), % of meat weight

• 2,270 g / 5 lb boneless pork shoulder, about 20–25% fat (Toluca makers work at about 80:20 meat to fat) (100%)

GREEN PASTE (% of meat weight)

• 340 g / 12.0 oz poblano chiles, roasted, peeled and seeded (15%)
• 227 g / 8.0 oz tomatillos, husked and rinsed (10%)
• 30 g / 1.0 oz serrano chiles (2–3), stemmed (1.3%)
• 114 g / 4.0 oz cilantro, leaves and tender stems (5%)
• 45 g / 1.6 oz flat-leaf parsley, leaves (2%)
• 68 g / 2.4 oz spinach, blanched and squeezed dry (3%)
• 91 g / 3.2 oz hulled pumpkin seeds (pepitas), toasted (4%)
• 16 g garlic (4–5 cloves) (0.7%)
• 91 g / 3.2 oz cider or white vinegar (4%)

SEASONING (% of meat weight)

• 45 g / 1.6 oz fine salt (2%)
• 3.4 g black pepper (0.15%)
• 4.5 g Mexican oregano, rubbed (0.2%)
• 2.3 g cumin, ground (0.1%)
• 4.5 g coriander seed, ground (0.2%)
• 0.7 g clove, ground (0.03%)
• 32–36 mm natural hog casing, about 15 ft / 4.5 m, tied every 3–4 in / 8–10 cm
• 1 roll butcher’s twine or cotton string, for the ties

Directions

Key ingredients

Black Pepper

1. In the collection: this is the green answer to Mexican Pork Chorizo (Jeff’s); make both once and fry them side by side. The flavours overlap with Salsa Verde and Roasted Tomatillo Salsa with Serranos, Onion and Cilantro, which is no coincidence.
2. Roast the poblanos: char them over a gas flame or under the broiler until black all over, sweat them in a covered bowl 15–20 minutes, then rub off the skins and remove seeds. Roasting gives the paste depth and takes off the raw green-pepper edge; the skins would stay as papery flecks.
3. Toast the pepitas: in a dry pan over medium heat, stirring, until they puff and pop, 3–4 minutes. Cool. Toasted seeds give the nutty note and thicken the paste; raw seeds taste of nothing.
4. Make the paste: blend the poblanos, tomatillos, serranos, cilantro, parsley, squeezed spinach, pepitas, garlic and vinegar with the salt and dry spices to a smooth, thick purée. Squeeze the spinach hard — every extra spoon of water ends up in the pan as steam. Chill the paste.
5. Grind: chill the pork to 30–32 °F / −1–0 °C and grind through a 6 mm (1/4 in) plate. Marianski uses 5 mm; anything coarser and the paste does not coat the meat evenly.
6. Mix: combine the pork and the cold paste and mix until it is uniformly green and slightly sticky, 2–3 minutes. This is a wet mix by design. Fry a teaspoon and taste: it should be bright, herbal and moderately hot, with the salt clearly there because the green vegetables dilute it.
7. Rest: cover and refrigerate 24 hours (Marianski’s step, and the Toluca habit of letting the seasoned meat stand). The acid and salt work into the meat and the colour deepens.
8. Stuff and tie: stuff loosely enough to tie, then tie every 3–4 in / 8–10 cm into a chain of short links. Toluca chorizos were tied with maguey fibre (ixtle); string does the same job.
9. Keep it fresh — no cure: Toluca makers report using no curing salts and sell this fresh. That makes it raw pork with a lot of vegetable moisture: refrigerate, cook within 2 days, or freeze the links the day they are made.
10. Cook: slit the casing and squeeze the meat into a dry or lightly oiled pan over medium heat. Break it up and fry 10–12 minutes, until the fat runs, the liquid evaporates and the crumbles brown at the edges, to 160 °F / 71 °C. Serve in corn tortillas, with scrambled eggs, or fried with diced boiled potatoes.
11. Sibling recipe: the Toluca valley’s other famous sausage is longaniza; see Longaniza de Valladolid (Yucatecan Smoked Sausage) for the Mexican longaniza family.

Notes

Where this recipe came from — and what it isn’t. The working numbers start from Marianski’s “Chorizo Verde” (pork shoulder; poblano 20%, tomatillo 20%, cilantro 9%, serrano, dried chipotle, cayenne, coriander, cumin, garlic; 9% vinegar; 1.2% salt; 5 mm plate; rest 24 h), and the ingredient list is checked against Quintero-Salazar’s 2017 review of Toluca chorizos, which tabulates what Toluca makers use. Deviations: (1) poblano and tomatillo cut to 15% and 10%, vinegar to 4% — Marianski’s total of about 50% added wet material makes a mix too loose to stuff; (2) pumpkin seeds, spinach and parsley added, all named by Toluca sources and by the dive; (3) dried chipotle and cayenne dropped — a smoky red chile works against the point of a green chorizo; (4) salt raised to 2.0% of the meat because the paste adds bulk and dilutes it. Untested.

Where chorizo verde came from. The pig reached the valley with Hernán Cortés, who had livestock farms in the Valle de Toluca by 1525; Alonso de Zorita, writing 1556–66, described longanizas and morcillas sold in Toluca’s plaza all year. That is the red chorizo’s history. The green one is recent. Quintero-Salazar (UAEMéx, NACAMEH 11(2), 2017) notes that Sánchez’s 1976 description of Toluca chorizo mentions only red chorizos built on ancho or jaral chiles, and concludes that green chorizo “podría corresponder a una innovación realizada en los años 70” — could be a 1970s innovation. Spanish Wikipedia says the 1960s. Either way it is a dating by absence, not a dated invention. The usual explanation — that rising prices of paprika and dried chiles pushed makers to cheap local green herbs — is repeated widely and has no primary source behind it.

How it is made and sold now. A 2011 survey counted 160 green-chorizo traders in the valley, concentrated in Santiago Tianguistenco, San Mateo Atenco and Toluca, with production also in Tenango, Mexicaltzingo, Capulhuac and Texcalyacac. Makers grade it comercial, almendrado (with almonds and other nuts, raisins and peanuts) and especial. Measured links ran 6–13.5 cm long and 31–42 mm across. Most makers report using no curing salts; the chorizo is sold fresh and is only slightly acidified if it sits unsold.

Variations. Almendrado: add 3% chopped blanched almonds and 2% raisins. Some makers use lettuce, chile cuaresmeño or jalapeño for the green. A milder version uses only poblano. The red Toluca chorizo uses the same base with dried puya, guajillo and árbol chiles, ginger, coriander seed and white wine or fruit vinegar — Sánchez wrote in 1976 that a chorizo worthy of the name toluqueño was set “to rot” in white wine, which the 2017 review reads as a lactic fermentation.

Sourcing and gear. Poblanos, tomatillos and serranos from any Mexican grocer; pepitas hulled and green. A blender or food processor for the paste. Freezer bags for what will not be cooked in two days.

Still open. Who made the first green chorizo, and in which town (Texcalyacac is often named), is not documented. The 1960s/1970s disagreement is unresolved.

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